Aftermath
by just slummin
Summary: Immediately follows the events of “Fractured” in a continuing Mal/River storyline. Many thanks to Midnight Obsidian, for the use of his wonderful characters, the crew of the Hit or Miss.
1. Chapter 1

**Aftermath**

**Part I--Adam**

Author: just-slummin

Disclaimer: Don't own 'em. Just playin' in Joss' sandbox again.

Rating: PG

Note: Immediately follows the events of "Fractured" in a continuing Mal/River storyline. Many thanks to Midnight Obsidian, for the use of his wonderful characters, the crew of the Hit or Miss.

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Adam sat at the galley table, swinging his legs as he worked on a new drawing. River, ever graceful, slid into the chair beside him with the faintest whisper of fabric against wood. Adam's legs abruptly stilled, the only evidence that he was aware of her presence.

River sat motionless for a time, her mind whirring with the impossibility of the conversation she needed to have with her son. How to handle the tender, new scars marring Adam's innocence in the aftermath of his connection with the little boy who in actuality had been a grown man and, unfortunately, a psychotic killer as well? Though she had no frame of reference as to what other mothers must deal with in their children, somehow she could not imagine a thornier problem than the one she faced with her Reader child now.

Slowly, she became aware of a slight presence in her psyche, skimming along her thoughts with the faintest of scratches. She turned large, liquid brown eyes to look at Adam in surprise. "Are you reading me?" she asked in astonishment.

Adam blushed, caught out by his wily mother. "Maybehaps, a little," he offered by way of a half-hearted admission.

River blinked slowly, mentally fingering Adam's presence in her thoughts gently. "It's not polite to read other people without their permission," she said quietly, though she did nothing to bar his intrusion just yet.

Adam had heard this same statement from her ever since it had become evident that he was indeed a Reader like his mother. And, up until now, he had taken it as a given. But something had changed forever for him with the nightmares that had wormed their way into his sleep, the nightmares of another child entirely visited upon him viciously night after night until recent events had abruptly stopped them.

"Why?" he asked, the barest hint of a challenge in his voice.

River sighed, knowing that she herself had often wondered at the ethical issues involved. If one was naturally endowed with the ability to see into the thoughts of others, was it actually wrong to use one's native abilities? People without the gift used their own perceptive powers to understand the 'verse around them, did they not? It was an old argument, a puzzle that she herself could not quite come to peace with. Clearing her mind of her own doubts before they could be easily read by her son, she said with an assurance she scarcely felt, "Because it can cause all manner of trouble to everyone involved."

Adam's brow wrinkled. "But sometimes it can help folks," he insisted. "Like the time I could find Daddy in the snow when the shuttle crashed."

"Yes," River conceded. "But that was an emergency, and it called for….unusual methods."

Half-formed shame flickered behind Adam's eyes, and River resisted the urge to do exactly what she had just told him not to do and pluck the thoughts from his mind. "It ain't normal, is it?" he asked in a small voice. "Bein' like us, I mean."

"'Normal' is a difficult concept to define," River replied. "There is no shame in having an extraordinary ability, Adam. And you, baby mine, have many extraordinary abilities." She smoothed the ever-present cowlick at the crown of his sandy brown hair.

Adam leaned into the softness of his mother's touch, needing desperately at just that moment to be reassured that he was not horribly different from other children. He slid out of his chair and into River's lap in one fluid motion.

River's arms encircled him and held him close. "Your unusual talents are not the sum of who you are, Adam," she whispered into his hair. "They are only a part of what makes you so special."

"Don't want to be special," he murmured, unable for the moment to look into his mother's sad eyes.

River smiled, tucking the sliver of heartache his words invoked away for later contemplation. "That's too bad," she said. "Because you are special, even without the ability to read people's thoughts."

"Am not," Adam said forlornly.

River pulled away from him, forcing him to look up into her eyes. "Are too," she insisted.

"How?"

"Well," River began. "You are very brave, maybe the bravest little boy I have ever known. And you are kind, a trait that not everyone in the 'verse can claim."

Adam took a deep breath. "Everybody on Serenity is brave," he said dismissively. "Even Hannah, and she's just a little baby."

"Perhaps," River agreed. "But bravery is not a trait that is all that common in the general population. And kindness is even more elusive."

Adam rested his head back against his mother's breast. "Captain Marcus killed that man, didn't he?" he asked, abruptly changing the subject to the one River had originally needed to discuss with him.

"Yes," she answered directly. "He did."

"And then that boy, the one in my dreams….he was just….gone," Adam said softly. "Where did he go?"

River took a deep breath, tempted to simply tell Adam an easy lie. But she resisted the urge, knowing he deserved as reasonable an answer as he could understand, considering what he had been through. "He died as well," she said gently.

Adam jerked upright. "Captain Marcus killed him too?" he asked, shocked at the thought that the man he considered a friend could do such a thing to a child.

"Adam," River said somberly. "The little boy whose thoughts you could feel was not really a little boy at all."

"What do you mean?" Adam asked, slightly agitated.

"The man who took your father and Elizabeth was…..sick. He was mentally unbalanced."

Adam stared at her in wide-eyed confusion. She went on. "Sometimes, when something terrible happens to someone, it affects his ability to function rationally. And occasionally…." She paused for a moment, to be sure Adam would pay attention to her next words. "….Very rarely, the horrible thing that happens might make a person's mind splinter…..sort of like wood broken into pieces for a campfire. And some of the pieces of his mind might stay the age he is, while other pieces grow into manhood and make him become someone else entirely."

Though Adam was gifted with River's intelligence, the concept was almost out of reach of his young mind. "Like…another person?"

"Sometimes several other people," River said, relieved that he seemed to at least grasp the basics of what she was saying. "So, the little boy that you read was not still a little boy, but was actually one of the splintered pieces of the man's mind."

"But he was not a bad boy," Adam said slowly. "He was scared all the time. He didn't want to be where he was. He wanted to…..to get away from the monster."

River nodded sadly. "But he could not get away, because he was the monster, even though he did not know it."

"And then he died," Adam whispered, tasting the words on his tongue gingerly.

"Yes," River said.

"That wasn't fair," Adam replied softly.

"No," River admitted. "It was not."

They sat silently for a long time, both immersed in their own thoughts. Finally, Adam spoke again. "Wasn't there any way to save the boy?" he asked wistfully.

"I don't know," River answered honestly. "But Captain Hazzard did what he did to protect as many innocent people as he could. The man who took your father had killed many, many people. And the boy had not been able to stop it from happening. He was not strong enough to fight the grown man."

Adam nodded, shuddering slightly at the memory of what the boy had seen. "He was a very bad man," he said.

"Yes."

Adam shifted uncomfortably in River's lap, unable to reconcile the feelings roiling within him just yet. "Will I dream of him again?" he asked, his voice trembling around the edges.

"I hope not," River said gently. "But if you do, you will know that it is only a dream. Nothing more. And nothing that can hurt you, or the people you care about. Dong ma?"

Adam nodded, acknowledging the reassurance. He thought about it for several minutes. "Why do you suppose the boy….picked me?" he asked finally.

"I don't believe that he did," River answered gently. "I think that he was not aware of you at all. He was frightened, so very frightened that his mind was calling out to someone…anyone….across the 'verse. And you were simply the one that heard."

"But you did not hear him," Adam observed.

"No, I did not," she confirmed. "I think he was calling out to someone…like him, someone young and impressionable like him. I could only sense fragments of the man, never the little boy." When Adam frowned, she admitted, "I don't know why."

"Did you….see what the man was doing?" Adam asked hesitantly.

"Just glimpses," River answered. "His mind was very….slippery. Splintered into too many parts for me to follow coherently."

"But I could follow the boy," Adam said.

River smiled softly. "Perhaps you are a more powerful reader than I am," she suggested.

Adam's eyes widened at the novel thought. "Is that a good thing?" he asked doubtfully.

"It can be, I believe," River replied calmly. "It might mean that you will be able to more successfully control what you read. And that can only be a good thing. Because, like any gift you have or tool you use, you need to be able to control it if possible. Does that make sense?"

"Uh huh," he said, absorbing her words carefully. "So….how do I do that?"

River smiled her encouragement. "We can practice," she said. "Just you and me. We will build walls and take them down. We will learn together. All right?"

Adam nodded eagerly, pleased and relieved to have some way to cope with the new emotions that he'd been exposed to in his nightmares. Feeling the sudden burst of hope shining in her son like a beacon, River said softly, "Let's begin, shall we?"

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To be continued


	2. Chapter 2

**Aftermath**

**Part II—Elizabeth**

Author: just_slummin

Disclaimer: Don't own 'em. Just playin' in Joss' sandbox.

Rating: PG

Summary: Follows the events of "Fractured". Elizabeth struggles with mixed emotions in the aftermath of her encounter with the psychopath known as Robert.

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Elizabeth rolled her neck slowly, stretching the muscles of her healing back gingerly. She sighed and felt once again the now familiar twinge of pain that a deep breath elicited. She knew she was more than fortunate that Robert had not succeeded in his maniacal murder attempt. She would not have been the first fatality of his psychosis had she died in the caretaker's little cottage in Serenity Valley. She closed her eyes for a moment, suppressing a shudder at the memory of his knife sinking deeply between her shoulder blades, barely missing the major organs there by some fortuitous circumstance. Also fortuitous was the fact that Simon had been on hand to repair the damage done and work his particular brand of magic on her blood-depleted body.

Elizabeth's mind drifted to thoughts of Adam Reynolds, plagued by nightmares of the little boy that had shared a body with her would-be killer. A part of her wanted to talk with Adam again, to see if his night terrors had ceased with the recovery of Mal from the clutches of the madman. But another part of her was reluctant to talk about the man at all, much less with a traumatized child. River had visited her bedside more than once, assuring her that Adam was healing as well as one might expect. But Elizabeth's clinical training was compelling her to talk with Adam herself. Perhaps tomorrow would be soon enough, she thought vaguely, delaying the conversation for one more day.

She shifted restlessly in the bed she shared with Marcus and instantly regretted the motion as pain throbbed abruptly between her shoulder blades. Cold sweat beaded across her upper lip. Stretching her arm out carefully, she reached for the small portable Cortex screen Marcus had left by the bed for her use during her convalescence. It was an extravagance he could scarcely afford, but he had waved away her protests about the cost, intent on making her recovery as pleasant as possible. The gesture was a perfect example of the gentle kindness that had drawn her to him in the first place. The thought of it warmed her beyond words.

She propped herself up more comfortably on the pillows at her back and waited for the screen to coalesce into something recognizable. Thinking that perhaps she would research some tissue regeneration techniques for Simon's use in treating Captain Reynolds, she decided to simply browse through the news first. She sipped from the cup of tea Marcus had left by the bed and began to read.

Abruptly, her throat closed and she found herself struggling to swallow her drink. With trembling fingers, she gripped the small Cortex screen as the 'verse swam in front of her eyes. Drawing a painful breath, she read the headline again. "Serial Killer Found Slain on Persephone."

Elizabeth read quickly, her mind racing as she devoured the main article and the multitude of sidebars that accompanied it. Stopping at a capture of Robert himself, smiling nonchalantly against a hazy background that revealed exactly nothing, she found it difficult to breathe for a long moment. This was the face of her tormentor, her captor, the man that invaded her own nightmares as well as those of the young Master Reynolds. But it was also the face of the frightened little boy that had reached out to her in her most terrified hours of captivity, the one that twisted her heart with his vulnerability.

Her tea grew cold as she read the news reports, each one more detailed than the last. The string of victims tied to Robert's credit was staggering in volume, and she realized in an even more complete way than she had known that she and Captain Reynolds had been in the direst of circumstances chained in the tiny ship that had ultimately become the tomb of the psychopath himself.

She felt relief, cool and liquid, wash over her as her mind took in the fact that she would never have occasion to worry that Robert would appear around some corner in a distant Rim world to take her and finish what he had begun. And yet, warring with that relief was a sorrow that she could scarcely define. She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the pillows, allowing her mind to wander over the various images of Robert that had been burned into her brain. And then, unable to stop herself, she pictured the boy Bobby, who had been caught up in Robert's horrors just as innocently as any of Robert's other victims. A small sob escaped her lips.

"Elizabeth?" Marcus' voice called softly from the doorway of their cabin. "Bao bei?"

She raised her head and the stricken look in her eyes catapulted him immediately to her side. "Are you all right?" he asked quickly. "Should I call Simon?"

"I'm all right," she answered, smiling dully. "Just…." She motioned to the Cortex screen. "He's….dead."

Marcus looked quickly at the screen, unaware that the body had been discovered until just that moment. Quickly scanning the report, he was relieved to see no mention of a suspect in the investigation of the murder. "Well, that's…good, right?" he said softly, not quite able to look into Elizabeth's eyes. "I mean, it's good to know that he won't be harming anyone else."

Elizabeth looked at her lover's profile, and a horrible realization crept slowly into her consciousness. "You did it, didn't you?" she whispered, the thought too painful to be spoken in a normal tone.

She watched in horrified fascination as her lover swallowed slowly and turned to meet her eyes. "Why would you think that?" he asked, though his voice sounded unnatural even to his own ears.

Elizabeth blinked slowly, unable for a moment to answer in the face of her growing certainty. "When I was unconscious," she said softly. "You….hunted him down….and killed him." Tears prickled behind her eyelids. "Didn't you?"

Marcus remembered Mal's admonition that secrets rarely lasted between a man and a woman. Silently cursing the truth of his friend's words, he replied quietly, "Yes."

Something in the simplicity of his answer cut Elizabeth to the bone. "How could you have done such a thing?" she whispered, stricken. "He was sick…mentally ill. He needed…help of some sort. He was not….responsible for his actions."

"Then who was?" Marcus answered, stung by her words. "Elizabeth, he killed over a hundred people, and almost managed to kill you as well. I couldn't just….allow him to go on his merry way. How could you ever have felt safe, knowing he was out there somewhere? How could any of us have felt safe, ever again?"

Elizabeth shook her head from side to side. "But that was not for you to decide," she protested weakly. "You had no right to act as judge and jury…"

"I had every right," Marcus said grimly. "A man has a basic, fundamental right to protect his family from harm. And this man, this monster, was not going to stop until someone…made him stop. Dong ma?" He looked intently at Elizabeth, forcing her to meet his eyes. "Are you saying that if you had had the chance to kill him when you were chained in his ship, you wouldn't have taken that chance?"

Elizabeth pondered her answer for a long while. "No," she said finally. "I'm…I'm not sure I could have killed him even then. Wounded him, certainly. At least enough to get Mal and me to safety, but to kill him…..I'm not certain I could have, knowing that he was mentally ill."

"Crazy in the brainpan or not," Marcus said more harshly than he intended, "He would have killed you without a moment's hesitation. You can be sure of it. There are dismembered bodies all over the 'verse that provide gorram convincing testament to that fact." He paused for a long moment. "This isn't the first time I've had to kill a man, Elizabeth. And unfortunately, it probably ain't the last. Not something I'm overfond of doing, but sometimes….it's gotta be done." He swallowed thickly, the pain in her eyes stabbing at his heart. "And I got no intention of apologizing for doing a thing that needed doing."

"But I was not in danger when you….did it," she replied in an anguished tone. "Captain Reynolds and I were safe." She could not suppress the mental image of her lover stalking Robert like prey from entering her mind and taking up residence there. "To hunt him down….like a dog….in cold blood…" Her words trailed off momentarily. "It's….it's not the same as…self-defense."

"No, it's not," Marcus agreed grimly. "But what would you have had me to do? Wait until he came for you, or for Mal, again? Or wait until he'd managed to kill several others before doing something about it? Spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder to see if he was somewhere waiting to finish what he'd started? You may have been willing to take that chance with your life, but I wasn't willing to." He paused, fighting for control. "Do you have any idea what…" His voice cracked slightly. "…what it was like to know that you were in the hands of a madman and that I couldn't protect you?"

Tears streamed steadily down Elizabeth's cheeks in mute answer. Finally, she spoke. "Why didn't you tell me before now?"

Marcus smiled wryly. Cupping her cheeks in the hollows of his palms, he brushed her tears away with the pad of his thumbs. "Because I didn't want to have this conversation…ever," he replied honestly.

"Because you knew I would not agree with what you did," Elizabeth said with certainty.

"That's about the size of it," Marcus admitted quietly.

"But you did it anyway," she whispered. "Despite what you knew about how I would feel."

Marcus nodded and met her gaze steadily. "Yep." Gently tracing the line that had appeared between her eyebrows with the tip of his index finger, he said, "Make no mistake about it, Elizabeth. I love you, and I fully intend to spend my life provin' it to you. But there are gonna be things that I have to do that ain't gonna set just right with you." He sighed slightly. "Just like there'll be things you do that don't set just right with me. But the way I see it, we're gonna just have to agree to deal with what happens as best we can, on account of there are just some things that are what they are. Looks to me like this is one of those things. I did what I thought was needful at the time. And truth be told, given the same circumstances today, I'd do it again. So, question is, is this somethin' you can handle? 'Cause if it's not, best you be telling me now."

She eyed him carefully, noting the pulse beating at his temple and the way his breathing was not quite as rhythmic as normal. She could feel an answering pulse beating in her own ears as she realized that all they would ever be together lay on the thin line between them. She desperately longed to close her eyes to shut out the question in his, but she could not in this defining moment of their lives take the cowardly way out. She sat bolted to the bed, her mind whirring dizzily as she tried to reconcile the tenderness and genuine goodness she knew he possessed with the violence he was undeniably capable of. "I imagine I'll handle it," she answered softly. "Though I cannot promise I will handle it particularly gracefully or well."

Marcus smiled, though the effort of it cost him a little part of his heart. "Couldn't ask for anything more," he said quietly.

The silence stretched between them, heavier and unaccustomedly uncomfortable at first as each one thought of the choices made and the cost of them. And then, ever so slowly, their hands crept closer together and their fingers entwined in wordless testimony to the love they had for each other and the life they were struggling to carve out together.

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To be continued


	3. Chapter 3

**Aftermath**

**Part III—Marcus**

Author: just_slummin

Disclaimer: Don't own 'em. Just playin' in Joss' sandbox.

Rating: PG

Summary: Follows the events of "Fractured" in a continuing Mal/River storyline. Marcus re-evaluates his choices.

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"Not much call for a man on the bridge when we're grounded," Pierre observed, stepping onto the bridge of the Hit or Miss with his usual graceful gait.

Marcus looked up, startled. "Came up here for the quiet, I guess," he admitted. "I started out in the common area, but Murdocke was in there tinkering with something and reciting some ancient limerick from Earth-That-Was about an old lady from somewhere named Nantucket. Said he found it on the Cortex and liked the sound of it."

Pierre, having been present when Murdocke had stumbled across the old story, grimaced in sympathy. "Well, so long as you weren't…" He motioned vaguely toward the nav console.

"What?" Marcus asked defensively, looking down at the items in his hand.

"Playing with your dolls," Pierre finished, grinning.

"Ain't dolls, as I believe I've told you a millions times," Marcus said. "They're action figures."

"Yeah, right. Whatever you say," Pierre replied, watching in amusement as his Captain put the figures back in their places.

Changing the subject, Marcus said, "I thought you had an appointment with that Greenleaf surgeon this morning."

A slight pink flush rose to Pierre's cheeks, and the thought crossed Marcus' mind that it was still a bit jarring to be able to see his pilot's emotions written so plainly across his face after years of trying to divine what went on behind the man's mask.

"I saw him," Pierre said. "Didn't much like the look of him, to tell the truth. Way too young to be an expert in the field. And besides.." He paused, shuffling his feet. "I think I'd rather just wait for my own doctor, if you know what I mean."

Mention of Elizabeth put a small crease between Marcus' eyebrows. "Understandable," he said quietly.

Pierre continued as though he did not notice the change in his captain's expression. "Speaking of my doctor, how is Elizabeth this morning? I haven't seen her yet."

"Doing better, I suppose," Marcus replied. "Still in some pain from that hundan's knife, though. Seems to me she's worn out most of the time. Simon says it's normal enough considering the amount of blood she lost."

Pierre nodded, easing down into the co-pilot's chair. "Thought for awhile there we were gonna lose her," he said softly. Seeing Marcus' jaw tighten, he hastened to add, "But she's a lot tougher than we give her credit for, I'd imagine."

"Is she?" Marcus replied.

"No doubt about it," Pierre answered, meeting his friend's troubled gaze head-on.

"I'm not so sure," Marcus admitted quietly. "She isn't….she wasn't…" He gestured vaguely. "This isn't the kind of life she's used to," he finished in a rush of words.

"What?" Pierre asked, raising one eyebrow. "You mean, getting kidnapped by a psychopath? I would imagine very few people are used to that kind of experience. But think about what she did when it happened. Captain Reynolds was too injured to escape alone, and yet, she was able to get him to safety. And, though the hundan did manage to hurt her, it wasn't as easy as he thought it would be to kill her, was it? She is, after all, still here."

"But she wouldn't be going through all this if it weren't for being with me," Marcus said, genuine anguish lacing his tone.

Pierre sighed. "How can you say that? She wasn't abducted because she was a member of this crew. She could have just as easily been abducted in the same exact way if she were a citizen of Greenleaf out on a stroll after Sunday school. Her involvement in the whole thing was perfectly random. Nothing more than collateral damage to the psycho."

"Perhaps," Marcus said slowly. "But I'm not just talking about what just happened. Think about everything she's been dragged through since she's been on this ship. It's no kind of life for a lady."

"You think she doesn't know her own mind?" Pierre pressed. "No one, not even you, is keeping her here if she should want to go. Have you forgotten that she applied for this job under her own steam?"

"I haven't forgotten," Marcus said irritably. "But she could not have known what would happen. I'm fair certain she would have found something else to do, some less….hazardous job somewhere, had she known."

Pierre shook his head. "For a man who claims to be in love with that woman, you don't seem to know her very well." Seeing Marcus begin to bristle, he continued, "When she applied for the job of ship's doctor, she was not running away from something. She was running toward something."

Marcus blinked in momentary confusion, his mind trying to wrap around the concept. "Like what?"

"Like you," Pierre said in exasperation. "Like freedom to live as she wants, without the constraints of society at large. Just because she's a small woman in stature does not mean she is a weakling. Woman has the heart of a warrior, to my way of thinking." He paused for a long moment. "Are you sure it's Elizabeth you're worried about, or is it you?"

"Come again?" Marcus growled.

Pierre shook his head from side to side. "Never thought I'd see it," he said softly. "I've been with you more years than I'd like to remember, and I've never seen you running scared before now."

"And what is it you think I'm running from?"

"The way you feel about her, for one," Pierre replied steadily. "It's more than hard to love a woman so much that the thought of losing her makes your heart skitter to a stop. Much easier to push her away than to give her all you are, considering that gorram fate can snatch her away at any moment, isn't it?"

"I'm not pushing her away," Marcus said gruffly.

"'Course you are," Pierre said, pressing the matter in the best interest of his friend. "What happened to her scared you spitless when you realized what your life would be without her, didn't it? Helluva lot easier to sit up here alone on the bridge thinking of reasons she shouldn't be with you in the first place, isn't it? So you can send her away with a clear conscience, under the guise of keeping her safe?"

"That ain't it at all," Marcus said hoarsely.

"Isn't it?" Pierre asked.

The two men stared at each other in silence for a long time before Marcus dropped his eyes. "Ain't ever loved a woman like this," he admitted quietly.

Pierre nodded silently.

"She found out I killed the hundan," he continued, staring at the floor as if it held all the 'verse's answers.

"Ah," Pierre said. "And I assume she thought that was an overreaction on your part."

Marcus nodded glumly.

"And yet, she's still here," Pierre said mildly. "Despite the apparent difference in your ideologies."

"Guess she is, at that," Marcus said.

"Can't imagine why, but the woman must love you," Pierre said, letting his affection for Marcus color his tone subtly.

"Must," Marcus agreed haltingly.

"So what's the problem?" Pierre asked gently. "Elizabeth knows her own mind. And if she wants to go, she'll go. But if she wants to stay, you'd be a fool to even question it, to my way of thinking."

"But the chances of her getting hurt, or even corpsified, with me are a lot more than if I sent her on her merry," Marcus said slowly. "Ain't that a fact?"

"So we'll protect as much as she allows," Pierre said, shrugging. "After all, Murdocke's still alive, and we haven't even really been trying to protect him."

Marcus laughed lightly. "Suppose that's true enough," he said, appreciating his friend's attempt at lightening his mood.

Pierre grinned, happy that his ploy had succeeded at least partially. "Besides, if you send her away, I won't have anywhere to wear the very fine shirt I found for the wedding. And a finely tailored shirt is not a thing to be wasted."

"How selfish of me to even contemplate it," Marcus said wryly. He stood, taking a moment to realign his action figures again just to annoy Pierre.

Pierre sighed. "Don't you have something better to be doing?" he asked.

Thinking of the woman resting in his bed, Marcus smiled slowly, his heart much lighter than it had been just moments ago. "Reckon I do at that," he said.

As Marcus left the bridge and headed to his cabin with a renewed spring in his step, Pierre allowed himself a small smile.

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To be continued


	4. Chapter 4

**Aftermath**

**Part IV—Mal**

Author: just_slummin

Disclaimer: Don't own 'em. Just playin' in Joss' sandbox.

Rating: R

Summary: Conclusion. Mal deals with the aftereffects of his time spent with the madman.

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Sliding gingerly off Simon's exam table, Mal slowly applied weight to his healing leg. Containing the grimace it caused, he straightened his back and tried to look perfectly at ease.

"It won't work, you know," Simon said, unfolding his arms from his chest and moving within a few inches of his teetering Captain. "I know it has to be very painful." When Mal scowled, he continued, "That series of tight, little fine lines around your eyes and mouth is quite telling."

"Ain't so bad," Mal lied through purposefully unclenched teeth.

Simon raised one elegant eyebrow. "I suppose not," he conceded dryly. "Considering that your pain tolerance can usually be measured on a sliding scale with a mere gun shot wound being the low standard and torture by a psychopath being the high standard."

"It ain't exactly like I set out for these things to happen," Mal protested, hopping a little as he became overbalanced. Simon handed him one crutch, his silence more eloquent than any words he could utter. Mal sighed, fitting the crutch securely under his unbroken arm. "Can I help it if every hundan in the 'verse seems to want a piece of me?"

"Perhaps it's the company you keep," Simon replied blandly.

"You think?" Mal said as he made a couple of uneven steps forward, testing his mobility with a growing sense of impatience. After another minute had elapsed, he turned expectant eyes toward his doctor. "So, I'm good to go?"

Simon nodded a little reluctantly. "I suppose so," he admitted. "If you promise to continue with the physical therapy every day, and you don't push yourself too hard, and…"

Mal held up his still-bandaged hand. "Heard it all before, doc. Don't need the reminder."

Simon nodded and quickly pressed an injection into the side of Mal's neck.

Mal jerked away. "What was that for?" he asked as petulantly as any three-year-old.

Simon smiled. "Pain meds," he replied. His eyes began to twinkle with barely concealed merriment. "Consider it cosmetic surgery to reduce those fine lines I mentioned earlier."

Knowing the meds would make him sleepy in short order, Mal muttered, "Still got an airlock on this boat, you know."

"Which is fairly useless while we're grounded," Simon retorted, grinning openly now.

"Won't be grounded for long." Mal tossed the observation over his shoulder as he made his way laboriously to the bridge.

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"Might not have made a difference anyway," River said softly, floating onto the bridge with her dancer's grace.

"What?" Mal asked.

"If the first war had not come," River said patiently as she curled herself into the co-pilot's chair.

"You reading me again, bao bei?"

"Couldn't help it," she said, shrugging with not an ounce of contrition. "You've been thinking it so loudly for several days."

Mal sighed. "Just hard to let go of, somehow," he admitted. "Man was all manner of disturbed in the brainpan. Maybehaps if he'd had a father….I mean, if the war hadn't come and taken the man away…..well, the boy, Bobbie, he seemed sort of….like a good boy."

"Like Adam, you mean," River said softly.

"Guess that's what I do mean," Mal admitted uncomfortably.

River nodded. "You see it all differently now, because you're a father," she said with gentle understanding.

"Conjure that's a pure truth," Mal agreed. He paused for a moment. "Been carrying around more'n my share of grief from that war for a long time. But even so, to see the hostility in that man's eyes…..the pure, burnin' hatred that was eating him alive…directed at me for no other reason than the color of my coat…..it was downright morbid and creepifying. And I got to thinkin', what would it take to make a man like that?" His voice dropped low. "To make a boy….like Adam…like that?"

"Adam will never be like that," River said quickly.

"I'd wager not," Mal replied. "But still….it's blood-chillin' to think about. Just one more horrible thing to come outta that war."

"If the war hadn't come," River said quietly, "where would you be today?"

Mal thought for a few minutes before answering. "On Shadow, most like," he said. "Can't really conjure leaving my mother to run the ranch alone." He rubbed distractedly at his aching leg.

River's heart twisted painfully. "Do you ever….think about…..going back?"

"Nothing to go back to," Mal said, a little too quickly.

River shook her head. "I mean, to a place like that. A ranch. A…home."

"Got a home," Mal replied steadily. "Right here. With you."

River unfolded her long legs and padded over to his chair. "Strong enough to hold me?" she asked.

Mal opened his arms. "Always," he replied with a slow smile.

River slid gently into his embrace, careful of his wounds. "Home," she hummed low against the shell of his ear.

"Home," he confirmed, his voice an octave lower than it had been moments before.

River kissed him, gently at first, a promise of other things to come when he was sufficiently healed. When her lips left his, his slight growl made her grin. "Not well enough yet," she said.

"Try me," he answered, leaning slightly forward to lick the line of her collarbone.

Feeling his hunger for her flaring brightly as a flame in her mind, she shivered. Entwined with the hunger was another need, fragile and whip-thin. She read and understood the need, recognizing it as one she knew well from her own bitter experience. He had survived, yet again, against odds that defied all logic. And in the surviving, there needed to be affirmation, a celebration of life and all that made it worth the living.

She slid from his lap, though he tried to hold her fast. "That's ain't in no way fair," he said, holding up his still-bandaged hands.

"Never said life was fair," she said, walking quickly to the door and locking it.

Hearing the click of the lock engage, Mal's heart skipped a beat. "Are you plannin' to have your wicked way with me, woman?" he asked huskily.

"Only if you promise to let me do all the work," River replied, her eyes shining brightly in the low light. As she spoke, she shimmied gracefully out of her dress.

Mal's breath caught in his throat, struck anew by how beautiful this woman was. Her smooth skin glowed invitingly, backlit by the lights of the nav console.

"Come here," Mal said softly.

She moved slowly toward him, watching the fire in his blue eyes deepen with each step she made. Then, achingly slowly, she slid back into his lap and kissed him, her lips and tongue distracting him from the work of her hands as she bared him to her as well.

He moaned softly as her warm, soft hands caressed him. "River," he breathed out raggedly.

"Shh," she murmured against his ear, smiling as she felt the twitch of his muscles beneath her fingertips. "Let me…."

"Wouldn't dream of stoppin' you, darlin'," he said a little breathlessly. And as she moved carefully atop him, he closed his eyes and felt his life, interrupted by his time with the madman, start anew once again.

XXXXXXXXXX


End file.
